CHAPTER 4: The Strange Bracelet

Togon was practicing his archery in the yard, as usual. He grinned contentedly as each of his arrows hit the middle of the target, and he could see from the corner of his eye, a group of palace maids huddling together and whispering about him.

"The Crown Prince is such an arrogant brat, showing off his archery skills again."

"There isn't anything good about the Crown Prince at all, apart from his handsome face."

"I heard that the Crown Prince even stabs people with his sword when they annoy him. We are lucky we don't serve the Crown Prince"

Togon sucked in a breath. He could hear every word they were whispering, and none of what they said was true. How dare they spread baseless rumors about him behind his back?

Pulling at the bowstring of his bow, he pretended to take aim at the target board. Suddenly, he swung himself around to face the whispering maids, pointing the arrow towards them. They screamed and ducked, covering their faces.

"Oops," Togon said, grinning and letting go of the bowstring.

It could have been his nightmare which was still clear in his mind, or maybe he hurt his head when he fell from the tree, which muddled his brain and caused him to lose his reason for a moment. Togon immediately regretted his actions the moment the arrow left his bow. Even though he trusted his archery skills, that was still too reckless.

The arrow ripped at the sleeve of one of the maids. They stumbled and shrieked hysterically, trying to get away.

From afar, a young man dressed in long and grand robes stood on a bridge over the pond and stared at the scene, shaking his head, "My, my. Look at that. It wouldn't do the country any good to have a king like him. He doesn't know how to treat his people properly."

He was Prince Balthazar, the King's younger brother.

Togon turned and noticed Balthazar on the bridge, spinning Togon's crown around his finger. "Barbaric banana!" he cursed quietly. Balthazar saw Togon watching and raised the crown, smirking.

Togon turned away, deciding that he was not going to stay and deal with Balthazar's taunting.

Ignoring Balthazar, Togon stalked off in the opposite direction, towards his chambers. His personal maids followed closely behind.

Inside his chambers, he winced and slowly lowered himself onto his chair. His back still hurt from his fall earlier in the day.

"Your Highness, have you hurt yourself?" the palace maid asked.

"No, I didn't," Togon lied, "I'm okay, you can leave."

Once he was alone, he relaxed and sighed. He would have to come up with a suitable explanation as to why his crown had been found on the ground in the Secret Garden.

"It fell off my head and I didn't notice," Togon murmured.

"I didn't notice that it had fallen off," Togon tried to repeat it more confidently.

"Really! I really didn't notice that it had fallen off!" Togon whispered desperately.

He sighed. How was anyone going to believe him if he couldn't even convince himself?

Suddenly, he felt a warm sensation on his wrist, where his bracelet was. He looked down at it and blinked. It wasn't the same bracelet anymore. It had changed into something circular and black, with strange symbols and arrows, and it had a black leather strap that went around his wrist like a bracelet. What on earth? How did it get there? Togon recoiled in horror. He hadn't taken off his bracelet the entire day. That means that the bracelet had just changed into something else, right on his wrist! Togon tried to take off the strange bracelet, to no avail. He looked at the strap and worked out some holes in the leather and strange metal shapes attached.

After fumbling for a while, Togon managed to get the strange bracelet off. He looked closely at the bracelet, and suddenly realized that it was moving! Not the bracelet of course, but one of the arrows on the bracelet was jerking forward millimeters at a time, going round and round the symbols at a fixed pace. Holy cow! What was this strange device? Togon dropped the bracelet on the table in shock, and stood up so quickly that his chair fell over with a crash.

From outside, the palace maid asked worriedly, "Are you okay, Your Highness?"

"Y-yes! I'm fine," Togon replied nervously, keeping his eyes on the bracelet.

After a while, Togon realized that nothing was happening to the bracelet, although the arrow was still moving. Feeling less wary of the bracelet, he picked it up and peered at it closely. If he just held his breath and listened carefully, he could make out a faint ticking sound coming from it. Fascinated, he studied the symbols and the arrows. There were twelve symbols and three arrows altogether, he counted. The arrows did not seem to have to point directly at any particular symbol, and some of them were pointing at the space between the symbols instead.

After studying the bracelet for a long time, Togon concluded that all three arrows were actually moving, but two of the arrows were moving so slowly that it was impossible to see them moving at all, however, you could see evidence that it moved as it pointed to a different symbol after some time.

"I'm so smart!" Togon praised himself happily. Proud of his achievement, he decided to wear the bracelet on his wrist. His wrist felt empty without his golden bracelet anyway. This interesting magical bracelet would replace the weight on his wrist that he was used to having.

Togon took even longer to put on the bracelet again than to take it off, but with his determination and confidence, he finally managed to attach it back in a loop and put it back on his wrist, even though it was too loose.

"That's alright, in that case, I will be able to slip it off easily if there is ever a need to," Togon assured himself.